NEW YORK — Stocks on Friday finished mostly lower, but a late surge in financial shares helped the Standard & Poor’s 500 preserve a fourth week of gains after the White House said it would expand a foreclosure-prevention program and hope grew for a Greek-debt deal.
“The big news the last couple of weeks is the program they launched over in Europe, the lending facility to the banking system, seems to be working,” said Owen Fitzpatrick, head of the U.S. equity group at Deutsche Bank.
Down much of the session, the financial sector reversed course in the final hour of trading as the White House said it would loosen rules on a loan-modification program.
The sector also drew a late lift from reports that Facebook plans a much-anticipated initial public offering next week, with The Wall Street Journal reporting investment banks Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs would participate. Both stocks closed near their highs of the session.
The Dow Jones industrial average lost 74.17 points, or 0.6 percent, to end at 12,660.46, down 0.5 percent for its first weekly loss in four.
Chevron shares were among those weighing on the blue-chip index, down 2.5 percent, after the oil major reported a drop in profit that also fell short of estimates.
Up 4.7 percent for the year so far, the S&P 500 index shifted briefly higher and ended the day down 2.1 points, or 0.2 percent, at 1,316.33, up 0.1 percent from the week-ago close.
“This earnings season hasn’t been nearly as robust as the last couple; there’s a bias toward companies beating versus missing, which is reflecting a slow-growing economy,” Fitzpatrick said.
Up 1.1 percent for the week, the Nasdaq composite index jumped 11.27 points, or 0.4 percent, to 2,816.55, with the index up 8.1 percent for the month and year so far.
“We’ve had such a good run, one of the strongest we’ve had in a long time from the start of the year, so we’re overdue,” Fitzpatrick said of the late-week decline in equities. “There are a lot of bullish surveys, which is usually a clear sign that things are going to correct.”
